


The Flip Of An Iron Coin

by Rhidee



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt Tony Stark, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Tony Stark-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-29
Updated: 2017-08-29
Packaged: 2018-12-21 05:28:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11937303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rhidee/pseuds/Rhidee
Summary: When a coin is flipped, a fate is determined.





	The Flip Of An Iron Coin

Some people say flipping a coin is the best way to make a decisions. But that no, it's not what it lands on that counts. It's that second, the coin spinning in the air, fate deciding. Where you realize what you really want. When you realize how it needs to land. When you make your choice.

That moment, staring at a coin, waiting to see how fate lands, is where we begin our story.

\---

Anthony Stark is a genius. Which makes him weak to things that destroy a genius. Power lust, for one. Pride, that's a biggy. Envy, ignorance. Lack of compassion for sure. Basically, weak to being a dick. Because, factually, strategically, being a dick is the easiest way to push for what you want. The problem with that lies in sentiment. People don't like dicks. Don't help them, don't care about them, just don't as much as they can with them. Karma is popular for a reason.

So if you make the smartest decision without factoring in other people, it will end badly for you. People love a sob story, hate a gloat. If you can't connect to people, you can't rely on them to help you. And humans were not made to be alone.

But Anthony Stark was.

Because who has ever been able to accept all of him? To really care? Pepper, who asked him to give up being iron man? Rhodey, who distanced himself? Certainly not the avengers, with their ungrateful cruelity.

Not Howard, god no. His mother? The closest, but not enough, never enough. Neither of them were enough, not in that house.

Being alone wears you down. It seeps into your bones, snug as a bug, and rots you from the inside out. Every touch you can't have, every word you can't say, locked inside forever. Filling yourself with so much, with no release. You fill up. Pressurize. Explode.

Like in Siberia.

But who wouldn't? Who wouldn't look, eyes dry from watching unblinking as the only person who even begin to care about you fully, to your childhood hero. To Captain fucking America, the standard you've always been held to, the man who you could never compare to, who took all the love you never even got to _taste_ and ask a simple question.  Did he know.  

And to feel it, screaming, in your bones, every bit of loneliness.  To feel betrayal, shoot like acid along your veins, because _this was supposed to be a team, your break, where you were finally fucking **wanted.**_

And now it's not.

Now every hope is gone.  And all that's left is years and years of nothing but pain.  Of being the scrap goat for everything.  Of paying money, money that could have helped people, money that could have _stopped people from killing moms oh god oh god oh god **mom-**_

On defending the reputation of the man who doesn't even care enough to tell you when you're funding your own orphan backstory.

Who wouldn't snap?

No really, who's above that?  Who is unaffected.

Anthony Stark is a genius.  Which makes him weak to things that destroy a genius. Power lust, for one. Pride, that's a biggy. Envy, ignorance. Lack of compassion for sure.

But he never fell to any.

Anthony Stark is a genius, but he was an actor first.

A scared boy in a big house with threats everywhere.  Walk right talk right don't let them know you're not alright.

Yes ma'am, no sir, thank you for holding the door.  Salad fork, make up, hope your mom will wake up.

It's not **safe.**

 

Tony Stark was made like iron is forged.  Heat and blows.

 

Tony Stark made who he is.  Never fell to power lust, never fell to pride.  Fought ignorance claw and tooth.  Cared about everyone no matter what they thought of him.  Envy haunted him, but he never let it sway his hand.  He made a mask, and made himself safe.  Wrapped up his feelings under and hoped they could never be used against him again.  But they were.

They always are.

So here's the ending of Tony Stark.

On a cold day in Siberia, cold like many days in Siberia tend to be, a man saw a graphic video depicting his parents' murder.  In fear of his life, he attacked the murderer and an accomplice who were present in the room.  His advanced technology and quick thinking tilted the odds in his favor, ending with the deaths of the two men.  The man, suit breaking around him, spent approximately ten minutes sitting on the ground in front of the deceased.  Blood at the crime scene suggests he made broad gestures, perhaps conversing with the bodies.  At the tenth minute, the man, Anthony Stark, stood up from his puddle of blood.  He turned away from the bodies, and took two steps towards the exit of the building.  And fell.

Anthony Stark died at approximately 7:24pm.  Cause of death is suspected to be a mix of internal bleeding, and the decreased lung capacity preventing air entering the brain.  Files have been wiped on those ten minutes of assumed conversation, spoken while Stark was dying and losing his mental functions.  No further investigations are required.


End file.
